The invention relates to heat exchanger structures, and in particular air-cooled heat exchangers.
Heat exchanger tower structures are in wide use in industry. Among the many types of heat exchanger towers, also often referred to as cooling towers, are towers that utilize tube bundle panels which are flat panels comprising a number of parallel running tubes. The tubes may in some cases have fins to assist with heat exchange. These structures are used, for example, to condense steam or to cool warm fluid such as process fluid from an industrial process. In the case of use to condense steam, they are often referred to as air cooled condensers. The warm fluid or steam, often from an industrial process, is supplied to the panels and flows through the tubes in the panels and is cooled by the tube bundle panels being in contact with ambient air. The condensate or cooled fluid is recovered from the panels and can be re-supplied to the industrial process.
In one type of heat exchanger tower structure, one or more tube bundle panels are oriented vertically and form one or more sides of a geometric tower structure, often referred to as a cell or module. The module may be square or rectangular in plan view, for example, or may be hexagonal in plan view. Often a plurality of such geometric tower structures are placed next to each other in rows, thus forming a combined tower facility that has a plurality of individual modules or cells. In some or all cases, the tube panels may be angled also relative to vertical. The tube bundle panels can be quite large and heavy, and a support structure is needed to support the tube panel bundles in their vertical positions, along with structure to support an outlet fan which may be located at the top of the cell. Other components of a module also need to be supported. Heretofore, this supporting structure has often been an on-site constructed frame structure in keeping with known cooling tower building procedures. However, it is always desirable to reduce the costs of labor and materials involved in erecting and operating such a structure. It is also desirable to develop one or more relatively standardized module configurations that can be erected and used quickly and easily.
An embodiment of the present invention is a cooling tower module with at least one heat exchange panel, a central column, a horizontal beam extending outward from the central column, and a first side structure connected to the horizontal beam to support the horizontal beam and connected to the panel to provide support to the at least one heat exchange panel.
Another embodiment features a cooling tower module with at least one heat exchanging means, a central vertical supporting means, a horizontal supporting means extending outward from the central vertical supporting means, and a first side structure connected to the horizontal supporting means to support the horizontal supporting means and connected to the panel to provide support to the at least one heat exchanging means.
Yet another embodiment of the present invention comprises a method for cooling fluid using a cooling tower module which supports at least one heat exchange panel using a central column, a horizontal beam extending outward from the central column, and a first side structure connected to the horizontal beam to support the horizontal beam and connected to the panel to provide support to the at least one heat exchange panel, and which passes fluid through the heat exchange panel to cool the fluid.
In another embodiment, a cooling tower facility includes a plurality of modules wherein each module has at least one heat exchange panel, a central column, a horizontal beam extending outward from the central column, and a first side structure connected to the horizontal beam to support the horizontal beam and connected to the panel to provide support to the at least one heat exchange panel.
A further embodiment of the invention includes a cooling tower module with four sides and a first pair of heat exchange panels having an internal angle and adjacent each other to form two sides of the modules. The module also comprises a second pair of heat exchange panels having an internal angle forming the opposite two sides of the module from the first pair, and a first side support structure forming one of the sides in between the panels. In addition, a second support structure forming the opposite side between the two panels from the first support structure, and a space truss horizontal beam extending from the first side support to the second side support is disclosed.
There has thus been outlined, rather broadly, certain embodiments of the invention in order that the detailed description thereof herein may be better understood, and in order that the present contribution to the art may be better appreciated. There are, of course, additional embodiments of the invention that will be described below and which will form the subject matter of the claims appended hereto.
In this respect, before explaining at least one embodiment of the invention in detail, it is to be understood that the invention is not limited in its application to the details of construction and to the arrangements of the components set forth in the following description or illustrated in the drawings. The invention is capable of embodiments in addition to those described and of being practiced and carried out in various ways. Also, it is to be understood that the phraseology and terminology employed herein, as well as the abstract, are for the purpose of description and should not be regarded as limiting.
As such, those skilled in the art will appreciate that the conception upon which this disclosure is based may readily be utilized as a basis for the designing of other structures, methods and systems for carrying out the several purposes of the present invention. It is important, therefore, that the claims be regarded as including such equivalent constructions insofar as they do not depart from the spirit and scope of the present invention.
Some embodiments according to the present invention provide a cooling structure and method which can employ one or more modules. Each of the modules supports one or more heat exchange elements in the form of tube bundle panels in the illustrated example. The construction of tube bundle panels themselves for cooling of fluid and/or condensing of steam is known.
The structures disclosed herein can support any suitable type of heat exchange element, and for example any type of panel or grid used for cooling and/or condensing fluid. Such panels may have relatively flat or curved profiles, and may have square, rectangular, triangular or other shapes. In one example, each of the tube bundle panels comprises a plurality of typically parallel tubes through which a fluid or steam is passed in order to cool the fluid or steam. Supply headers feed the fluid or steam to the parallel bundle tubes and return headers remove the cooled fluid or condensate from the parallel bundle tubes.
Some embodiments as described below provide a desirable support structure for supporting such tube bundle panels. Some preferred embodiments will now be described with reference to the drawing figures, in which like reference numbers refer to like parts throughout.
In general, it will be appreciated that each module 12 has a total of four tube bundle panels 14 with the panels 14 being arranged in dihedral angle pairs (see
Each module 12 also includes an outlet fan 20 which is surrounded by a fan shroud ring 22. The fan 20 and shroud 22 are supported by an internal support structure that is described in more detail below. A fabric top covering 24 spans between the fan shroud 22 and the panels 14. The modules 12 can have their internal volumes isolated from each other at their adjoining sides by a fabric end barrier 26 between adjacent modules 12. The end modules 13 also feature fabric end barriers 27 on their exposed outer ends.
Each module 12 is supported by a central support column 30, as well as a pair of end support structures and a variety of peripheral support legs that will be described with respect to further drawings. A bottom fabric covering 28 is also provided so that in combination to the other fabric coverings 24, 26 and 27, an air flow path is defined in which air entering the tower is essentially restricted to entering through the tube bundle panels 14, and exiting via the outlet fan 20.
Although the example illustrated will involve four modules 12 with the two end modules 13 being substantially identical to each other and the two interior modules 15 being substantially identical to each other, other individual modules can be constructed as well as longer or shorter rows of modules including the case of a single module. Also, although the module examples 12 described herein are six-sided examples in which four of the six sides have tube bundle panels 14, it will be appreciated that other shapes can be employed and a different number of sides of the other shapes, or a different number of sides of a six-sided shape, can incorporate or omit tube bundle panels. Also, although steam condensing tube panel bundles are described as an example of a suitable heat exchange medium, other heat exchange medium can be supported instead, or in addition by the support structures disclosed herein.
Turning next to
Turning to
Fabric structures close (1) the vertical gap between the “active faces” and, as well, between the partition walls and the “active faces”, (2) the hexagonal horizontal surface at the base of the “active faces” as well as the transversal partition or gable wall, and (3) the space between the fan shroud and the top of the finned tube bundles.
In some embodiments, every welded structural element or component is sized as large as possible, but in such a way to be easily hot galvanized and packed in standard maritime containers, in order to limit on site mechanical connections.
Additional prestressed cables with horizontal struts (i) increase the stiffness of the system. Struts (i) also transfer the horizontal load at base of the bundles to the system. Horizontal loads such as from earthquakes on the main ducts are transferred to the system with struts. Support cables 68 can also be suspended by the cantilever arms 66 and such cables 68 can provide vertical support to the steam supply tubes 40 (not shown in
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The transversal bracing of the tower is provided by the “top horizontal truss” (hereunder described)transferring the horizontal load to a “vertical transversal bracing system” (hereunder describe) placed at mid distance between the columns as well as at the gables. The “top horizontal truss” is composed of 4 compression struts connecting the 4 upper corners at the columns to the 4 longitudinal corners of each hexagonal cell. Those 4 corners are connected by tension cables or rods forming a rectangle.
The embodiment 200 differs in that it does not necessarily utilized any structure corresponding to the central support columns 30 of the first embodiment of
The many features and advantages of the invention are apparent from the detailed specification, and thus, it is intended by the appended claims to cover all such features and advantages of the invention which fall within the true spirit and scope of the invention. Further, since numerous modifications and variations will readily occur to those skilled in the art, it is not desired to limit the invention to the exact construction and operation illustrated and described, and accordingly, all suitable modifications and equivalents may be resorted to, falling within the scope of the invention.
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20100078147 A1 | Apr 2010 | US |